Game-ball.



B. C. RIBLET.

vGAME BALL.

APPLIOATION FILED AUG. 1e, 1907.

906,932. Patented Dec. 15, 1908.

@Para :gf/@3 v exterior surf aces.

BYRON (l. RIBLE'I, OF ST. LOUIS. MISSOURI.

Giuria-BALL.

No. 906,932. Specification of Letters Patent. Patented Dec. 15, 1908.

Application filed. August 16, 1907. Serial No. 388,767

T o all whom it 4may concern:

I ters have been produced upon the ball either Be it known that I, BYRON(l. RIBLET, a I during the manufacture thereof or .subsecitizen of theUnited `States of America, .re-

quently, as may be desirable, I paint the sur-v siding in the' citylo'fSt. Louis and State of 1 Missouri, have invented cert-am new and iisefulImprovements inGame-Balls, of uhich the following is a full, clear, andenactI de# scription, reference being/had to 'the' accon'ianyingdrawings, 'forming part of this specication.

My invention relates to balls such asI are ordinarilyr used in layinggames and of which I will mention go f balls'as being particular onesin. which my im rovement iso'f utility.

Games, such as go f, are played upon the same territory by a number ofpersons, and it has heretofore been a difficult problem for the ownersof the gaine balls to keep track of or identify their particular ballsor distinguish them from the balls owned by others, so that each playermay retain possession of his own l property or regain iossession in theevent of l i owner of the ball may readily prepare the the ballsbecoming ost or mislaid and subsequently found.

It is the object of my invention to provide means whereby each ofseveral game ma readily. and conveniently mar bal s for identification.

Figure I is ,an elevatori of a gamey ball pro vided with Vmy means forplayers identification. Fig. II is a similar view to Fig. I,

illustrating a varied style of players identin fication markingl Fig.III is anenlarged view of a portion of the playrs identificationmarkings shown in Fi I. Fig. IV is a cross section taken on line V-IV,Fig. III.

Without restrictin myself tothe particu,- lar type of game bal? to whichmy improvement may be applied, I have shown in the drawings and willhereinafter describe, a game ball, such as are used in playing a gaineof golf and which balls are usually made with numerous knobs orprotuberances at their Upon lthe exterior surface of the game ball toWhiclimy improvement is `to be a plied, I produce two or more complete aphabets whichare, when placed upon a golf ball that is made with theknobs or protuberances mentioned, arranged upon said knobs ornrotuberances as illustrated in Figs. I' andi. The characters of thealphabets `are preferabiy arranged in succession and at one end oi' eachseries oi characters I preferably locate a starshaped gure that servesas a character innesca-set ci? characters; Atte?? the charac- Iplayers gtheir l of lndicating his initials thereon, or his name.

alphabets as the characters upon the balls, l i

use two or more series of numerals preferably 'from 0 to 97 and in thismarking also preferably produce upon the ball a final character orfigure` at the end of each set of numerals. A

Each ball that is made in accordance with my improvement is in acondition to be readily operated upon by any person who may purchase itin order that the ball may thereafter be identified as his personalproperty. To provide for such identification, the

ball illustrated in Figs.` I and II for identification by scraping thepaint or covering from the surface of any desired number of charactersappearing upon the ball with the object I-Ie may also scrape the paintfrom the surface of the i'inal character, for instance the star, at theend of the set of characters of which none is used, if such be the case,for the purpose of preventing anyother party who may gain possession lofthe ball yfrom marking another initial inthe unused set to make theinitials correspond to his own, with fraudulent intent. This'is possibledue to it being the intention in the use ofthe i1nprovenient to utilizeonly a single character inf-each set of characters, when the ball isoperated upon to enable its owner to identify it. The operation upon theball to identify it, which has just been described, is illustrated byeX- ample in Figs. I and III of the drawings in which the letters A B Uappear in the different alphabetical sets. These letters are present inthe three sets of alphabets illustrated, therefore in such instances itis unnecessary to utilize the star or guard mark at the end of eitheralphabetical set.

When' the ball shown in Fig. II is to be pre4 pared for ownersidentiiication, the surface paint over any of the numerals appearing"vupon the ball may be removed thereby el posing the numerals to fuii viewwith suit of providing the iden'tiiication f owner of the ball Wishes toproduce. He may also remove the paint from the surface of the finalcharacter at the end ofY the vroW of numerals which is unused therebypreventing another person from' using any character in said row to alterthe identification marking.

In example given in Fig. II, the numerals 2 and 3 are utilized in two ofthe sets of numerals shown indicating that the number employed by theowner of the ball is 23 and the guard character at thevend of the thirdset of numerals is caused to appear in said set for the purpose ofpreventin any use of a numeral in thislast named set y a fraudulenterson, who might Wish for his oWn gain to alter the number ap learing onthe ball.

My ame ball is re erably coated with paint o a different co or from thecolor of the Y material forming the outer layer or body of the ball inorder that when the coating of paint is removed from any one or morecharacters upon the ball such character or characters will ap eardistinctly and be readily distinguished from the other charac ters whichremain. coated With the paint ap lied thereto.

claim:

. A game ball having formed on its surface two or more identical seriesof characters, each character differing from all the others in the sameseries, and a removable coating over the characters.

BLANCHE HoGN, H. GQCOOK.

